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Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Ol' Dog

Ol’ Dog

The proper southern home is not complete without its front porch

Before Willis Carrier it offered a hint of shade and the only escape from

The stifling heat to catch a bit of breeze or sip cool lemonade

The kind of center of traditional family life

And no porch is complete without an ol’ dog

It’s a special kind of decoration and a pedigree pooch won’t pass muster

What is required is a mangy mongrelly kind of hound of

Unknown lineage-his daddy was just passing through town

It can be displayed in several ways-under the porch seeking shade

And thankfully bringing the fleas along

Or above languishing in the empty space along the cracked boards

Between the weathered rockers struggling to hang on to their last

Flecks of paint

The couch now mostly bulging foam relic from some past lay away

The dead stove gently and quietly rusting with the seasons

When work weary bones trudge the dirt path to home

He’s there

Tail wag wiggling from the neck down

Ol’ dog is always as happy to see you as the first time

And no stately mansion offers a finer welcome mat

_______________________________________

Jim Carson is an Architect living in Atlanta with his wife, daughter and Snickers the wonder dog. His work has been published in numerous journals and includes poems published at The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature, Southern Fried Weirdness, The Foliate Oak, Clapboard House and Pocket Change (of which he has received little for his work). He can be reached at jcarson@ncgarch.com.

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Pat Conroy just told me that I take a foul art and give it a queenly air, then he kissed my hand.

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In no particular order: Bill Bryson and James Herriot....I have re-read anything they write multiple times.We're All DamagedThe End of the World Running ClubHandmaid's Tale Watership DownRiversDesperation RoadBull Mountain The Stand The Poisonwood Bible Black Beauty The Road... read once, will never read again, but it stuck. Lonesome Dove Gone With The Wind....of course Earth Abides A Brave New World

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